Flat out Part IV: Strange flats

A little while back I added some Panaracer Flataway tyre liners to my commuting tyres in the hope that they would prevent any flats.  So far so good, and I hadn't really had many flats at all in the past 2 years.   However I arrived at work one day and I had a rear flat...  There were no real obvious penetrations in the tyres so it was a bit of a mystery.  However when I got it home I noticed something quite odd...

The tyre liner itself had all these zigzag cuts in it, they matched the tread of the Schwalbe Marathon tyres.  Presumably this is from repeated stretching each time the tyre rotated around and the section was loaded.   The Panaracer Flataway is made from an aramid fibre of some sort, however it seems to have completely degraded after two years of daily commuting.



This left an impression on the tube, and over time it appears the rubbing abraded a hole into the tube itself.  I could hear air escaping out of this section.  The tube was now useless from this and I tore out the tyre liner and stuck a new tube in.  Lesson learned!

I had a look at the front wheel which also had the same tyre liner in it, however it was completely intact and the tube was perfectly fine.  So I guess it may be due to the higher weight borne by the rear wheel which has caused this problem.  Thanks for reading!